Mozilla has launched a new directory with the goal of providing a one-stop shop for open web tools and resources for developers. It is called the Open Web tools Directory.

The reason Mozilla says it decided to start this directory is simply because there isn’t one like it. "There’s no central index of these tools," the company says in a blog post.

Second Life creators Linden Lab have launched a new Second Life-compatible viewer, which the company developed with the open source community. The company’s goal was to create a "widely-used, openly developed version of the Second Life client."

Snowglobe will contain new Second Life features before they become available in the official release. That said, not all features will make it there.

Okay, no, not really—but the encyclopedia anyone can edit is looking to add video to its offerings, according to Technology Review (via RWW).

Earlier in the year, Google gave developers a preview of a new open-source quick search box for Mac outside of the browser. The company has now made this available to everyone.

Google Update, which is now being referred to as Omaha, is a program that installs requested software and keeps it up to date. It comes with Google products like Google Chrome and Google Earth for Windows.

Since President Obama was sworn in and Whitehouse.gov has switched to a new interface, there has been an endless amount of chatter about the state of the White House’s technology. Some discuss the shortcomings, while others defend it as just fine.

Tradition and Transition

Google has introduced a new Sitemap Generator for webmasters to help them create better sitemap files. Google had previously introduced one back in 2005, and watched many other people make their own, but this one is different they say.

Criticism of the rising cloud computing meme has come from a seemingly unlikely place: GNU creator and Free Software Foundation founder Richard Stallman. Traditionally, any option to Microsoft’s dominance would be a welcomed change in the open source community, but Stallman foresees corporate bullies being replaced with different corporate bullies who would put your privacy at risk.

Criticism of the rising cloud computing meme has come from a seemingly unlikely place: GNU creator and Free Software Foundation founder Richard Stallman. Traditionally, any option to Microsoft’s dominance would be a welcomed change in the open source community, but Stallman foresees corporate bullies being replaced with different corporate bullies who would put your privacy at risk.

Criticism of the rising cloud computing meme has come from a seemingly unlikely place: GNU creator and Free Software Foundation founder Richard Stallman. Traditionally, any option to Microsoft’s dominance would be a welcomed change in the open source community, but Stallman foresees corporate bullies being replaced with different corporate bullies who would put your privacy at risk.

Criticism of the rising cloud computing meme has come from a seemingly unlikely place: GNU creator and Free Software Foundation founder Richard Stallman. Traditionally, any option to Microsoft’s dominance would be a welcomed change in the open source community, but Stallman foresees corporate bullies being replaced with different corporate bullies who would put your privacy at risk.

Yahoo! kicked off Open Hack 2008 today at its headquarters in Sunnyvale. The company has already demonstrated new components of its "open strategy".  The below video is a teaser for the event.

Quebec’s open source organization Facil is suing the province’s government for spending millions of dollars on Microsoft software, and never entertaining the idea of using anything open source. The problem here is that there is no room for competition  because the government automatically goes to Microsoft.

It’s been a rough time of late for Internet Radio, and music sites in general. Pandora’s expecting to shut down. Karaoke videos have been pulled. Muxtape was shut down.

It’s no secret that there’s money in open source software. So naturally, along with it comes some rules.

"Copyright holders who engage in open source licensing have the right to control the modification and distribution of copyrighted material."

So says the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

Microsoft made three announcements at the 2008 OSCON in Portland, one of which should be a stunner to anyone who’s followed the company over the past decade.

MySQL created a bit of an uproar when it seemed ready to close sourcing portions of the MySQL server.  Now, in what’s a nod to the power of crowds in more than one way, the decision has been reversed.

Ever see the animation in which a figure wears down his fingers, arms, and then head while typing quickly?  IT admins risk becoming that figure if they’ve got to create too many accounts in Google Apps.  Or they can avoid the bloodshed and use the new Open Source Google Apps Provisioning Toolkit.

Yahoo’s done one impressive thing after another since Microsoft threatened to acquire it, and now, in a step that should make the open source community proud, Yahoo has announced that it’s running "the world’s largest Hadoop application, a 10,000 core Linux cluster producing data used by the Yahoo! Search Webmap."

Like eating fruits and vegetables or building lighter cars, open-source technology seemed like the sort of good idea that would always go ignored.  But according to Gartner, elements of open-source technology will be present in 80 percent of all commercial software by the year 2012.

Fleury and Rodrigues Separated at Birth?

Come on, you have to admit, the resemblance is uncanny. I’m obviously kidding. I’m much better looking. His sizable bank account and ability to keep a beat probably balances the score though